Adaptive Bighorn Sheep and Mountain Goat Management Project
The Adaptive Sheep and Goat Management project is a project that works to assess the impacts of different management tools on bighorn sheep and mountain goat populations. This effort is a collaborative effort between the 猎奇重口 Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit and 猎奇重口 Fish, Wildlife, and Parks.
The first objective of this project is to evaluate population demographic rates for bighorn sheep and mountain goats. Specifically, we are looking at how management tools such as habitat, pathogen and predation management, population reintroduction, range expansion, augmentation, and hunting regulations impact demographic rates in bighorn sheep and mountain goats. To do this, we will be creating Integrated Population Models that allow us to leverage multiple data sources for estimating both demographic rates and population size. The results of this objective will provide managers with a tool that can help them choose which management action may be most effective for their herd based on results of management in similar herds. Additionally, we will be evaluating differences in demographic rates between native and introduced mountain goat populations. These results will provide valuable data that will both indicate the differences in native and introduced populations and provide reference demographic rates to compare with rates following potential augmentation of native herds.
We will also be evaluating the risk of pneumonia epizootics within both bighorn sheep and mountain goat populations. Previous work () allowed managers in 猎奇重口 to prioritize bighorn sheep populations for monitoring efforts. We will build on that framework by including more covariates and finer resolution results with which managers can improve their monitoring practices.
Evaluating Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) Management Strategies Across State Boundaries
This ongoing project aims to evaluate innovative stakeholder engagement approaches for managing deer and chronic wasting disease (CWD) and ultimately improving white-tailed deer population health across the Midwest. Arising from the CWD Research Consortium and led by both state wildlife agencies and universities, this multi-year effort seeks to strengthen coordination across state boundaries while integrating adaptive management and structured decision making with behavioral change interventions to improve both white-tailed deer and CWD management.
In collaboration with wildlife agencies from Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ohio, and Wisconsin, we are working toward initiating a unified project framework across states to assess how different behavioral change interventions influence the partnership between hunters and state management agencies and ultimately CWD dynamics and deer populations. By leveraging expertise in disease ecology, population management, social science and decision science, this project will help refine strategies that promote healthier deer herds and more effective long-term management across jurisdictions.
Beyond the biological aspects of disease management, this project is deeply rooted in human dimensions research and is heavily focused on engaging landowners and hunters. Through hands-on outreach efforts, we aim to encourage hunters and landowners to partner with state agencies to achieve mutual objectives for managing healthy deer populations.
This project was initiated by the and ies. It is supported through collaboration with state wildlife agencies from the respective Midwestern states, researchers from our lab, including Dr. Dan Walsh and Maggie Johnson, multiple researchers and faculty from the 猎奇重口, Purdue University, Michigan State University, University of Minnesota, USDA-APHIS National Wildlife Research Center and USGS.
Curious to learn more? Check out the CWD Research Consortium at .
Highlands Bighorn Sheep Project
One of the factors limiting many bighorn sheep populations is respiratory disease, particularly in lambs (). The gregarious nature of bighorn sheep results in high contact rates among individuals, particularly in ewe-young groups, potentially allowing a few infected animals to transmit respiratory pathogens throughout the nursery group. The resulting disease ultimately impacts vital rates and can result in stagnant or decreasing populations. The removal of adults that ares chronically shedding Mycoplasma ovipneumoniae (M. ovi) aims to interrupt this epidemiological process and has been used successfully in some herds to improve population performance (). The main challenge in applying this management approach is identifying chronically shedding animals because there may be multiple individuals shedding M. ovi at any given time and it is logistically difficult to capture and sample the same individuals over multiple years, which is required to identify chronically shedding animals. Further, given some uncertainty in disease testing efficacy (, ), repeat testing may or may not accurately identify chronically shedding individuals.
Our research experiment is a collaborative effort between the 猎奇重口 Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit and 猎奇重口 Fish, Wildlife, and Parks that is focused on evaluating the effectiveness of test and removal of chronically shedding bighorn sheep on neonate survival and population growth using a before-after sampling design. Our sampling design includes three years of pre-treatment monitoring, removals of identified chronically shedding individuals starting at the end of the third year, and three years of post-treatment monitoring. Our project goals are:
- Collect movement data and pathogen profiles on all juveniles and adults in the Highland Mountains for three years pre-treatment and three years post-treatment.
- Monitor adult and neonate survival for three years pre-treatment and three years post-treatment.
- Evaluate the effects of test and removal on neonate survival and population growth.
- Develop recommendations for application of test-and-remove management treatments to facilitate recovery of bighorn sheep populations.
New solutions for old problems: application of a systems approach for management of chronic wasting disease
The application of systems thinking to wildlife management is grounded in the knowledge that successfully managing wildlife requires not only an understanding of the environmental mechanisms that drive flora and fauna patterns, but the mechanisms that dictate the social and political actions which in turn influence ecosystems. Agencies require new management tools and approaches that account for socio-political pressures that determine the viability and success of management outcomes. The use of systems thinking approaches has been successful in the public health sector for describing and mapping factors that influence complex problems. System dynamics modeling uses systems thinking insight to create large-scale, differential equation models that describe a system of interest and explore its behavior through computer simulation. A collaborative effort between the 猎奇重口 Cooperative Research Unit and the USGS- National Wildlife Health Center was launched to pilot the use of systems thinking for improving the management of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD).
CWD is a significant management challenge in part because the etiological agent, an infectious prion, is extremely difficult to destroy, and can be transmitted directly or indirectly. The majority of management interventions to date require altering densities of deer which is not universally supported by stakeholders. A partnership with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and Ventana Systems, Inc. facilitated the development of a CWD system dynamics model of the complex relationships between biological, social, and political processes affecting CWD epidemiology and management. A participatory modeling approach was used during a series of workshops with stakeholder groups and experts to integrate into the model design existing knowledge and data on the ecological and social processes affecting the disease and its management. The CWD systems model has been fit to deer population and CWD surveillance data as well as hunter license numbers in WI to explore the feasibility and efficacy of management options available to WI. The pilot project in WI has led to collaboration with other states to expand and adapt the systems approach to address state specific questions that will help guide their management of CWD.